View from the top with Lee Sterrey

?I cannot underestimate what we have been able to achieve, particularly this season and the issue of the African players we had lined up.
?We needed a letter for immigration from the FFA and that wasn?t forthcoming and we were not told until Round 9 of the NSW Premier League season and it was the two lads we had last year and they were to bring another two with them so our playing roster, which started at only 16-players to being with, put us 25% down with just 12-players and with two of them being ?keepers it left us just 10-outfield players.
?Then Matt Hall did his ligaments in the first pre-season match and needed a complete knee reconstruction so we didn?t have the playing staff at that point to even field a side competitively.?
Sterrey has always been able to get the best from a seemingly poor situation and was left to fast track plenty of the Under 20 and Under 18 squad members to the first team and indeed gave around 10-youngsters their NSW Premier League debut, a feat almost unprecedented in the league.
?We had no choice after the African affair but I knew we had promisingly young players in our youth teams who wouldn?t let us down and if you look at the season as a whole we spent seventeen of the 22-rounds inside the top two positions and 10-at the top which is a decent effort by any standards.?
With so much new blood in the side they did struggle, especially against Blacktown Spartans in the semi-final of the McDonalds Cup where they needed a lucky effort to scrape through to the final with literally seconds left in extra-time when they were played off the park for much of the game but football has a knack of evening things out over the course of a season and they went on to lift the trophy and thereby bringing silverware to Marconi for the first time in 15-years.
?We?ve had a hardcore of maybe five or six senior players like Nahuatl Aerate and Matthew Gordon, amongst others, who have held the side together but it has been a magnificent achievement to get where we are and lift the cup under the conditions we had to play against.
?It shows that we are continuing to head in the right direction.?
The Under 20 side has just missed out on the semis despite missing so many players going up to first grade and (at time of writing) the Under 18 team was still in with a shout of going one further to prove the depth of talent Marconi are fostering at the time and with many off to play in the National Youth League competition it augers well for the future and Sterrey has played no small part in this.
In fact, since Sterrey came back to the club that managed to finish second to Sydney United and reach the Grand Final, going down to Sutherland Sharks, last season and lift the McDonalds Cup and make the Top Five this year but as the likeable coach joked.
?We had to decide where we could all go and celebrate with our win bonuses because half the side were too young to go to the pub and the rest didn?t fancy going to Time Zone,? he laughed.
Looking to their elimination match against staunch rivals A.P.I.A.-Leichhardt Tigers this weekend Sterrey admitted it was going to take a lot to get a positive result on Sunday.
?They are a very tough prospect and as good as any team in this league and it will take a mighty effort to overcome them this weekend but with everything we?ve had to endure this season it?s almost a case of we have everything to gain and nothing to lose so we?ll go to the match with one thing on our minds ? play our game and let them worry about us to be honest.
?I have a young team going out against a very experienced side that when coached properly are a formidable side to combat and we want to buck the trend that experience will win the day because our lads didn?t have it at the start of the campaign but they had to learn quickly in this league and the worry is always there that the big occasion will be too much for them but they held it together for the cup win so I am hopeful they will stand up once more.?
As a former NSL coach it would seem logical that Sterrey looks to the A-League in the future but as he states.
?Look, I will do everything I can to keep Marconi going forward but obviously I want to coach in the A-League or Asia and that?s where I see my future down the track but until then I am happy here and we all want further success.
?I wouldn?t rule out a move overseas and we?ll see about that in time but when I came to this club it was with the intention of taking it forward and becoming more competitive and serious title challengers and although I see we have made great inroads toward doing that I could say the job, in that respect, is done but there is so much more to achieve and we will strive to do that as we progress.?
Lee Sterrey is an astute coach who wouldn?t be out of place in the A-League but should we lose him to an overseas club it would be a case of our loss so let?s hope that doesn?t happen but if it should we wish him well with all his future endeavours.
-By Micky Brock